Prep wrestling: Wallowa’s Ramsden rebounds after injury

Published 10:00 am Monday, January 2, 2023

WALLOWA — Lute Ramsden recently was on the slate to compete in a third-place match at the Red Lion Invitational wrestling tournament in Pendleton.

But the senior on the Enterprise wrestling team, which this season is in a cooperative on the mat with Wallowa — Ramsden’s school — forfeited the match, settling for fourth.

It’s not that he couldn’t have competed in the match, or even won, but Ramsden, who was nursing a minor rib injury that was “tweaked” during an earlier match, didn’t want to chance a worse injury for the difference of one place in the tournament.

“One match to decide third or fourth place is nothing compared to the rest of the year,” he said.

His head coach, Court Fent, said the move was a smart one.

“This is where some of his IQ comes into play. I expressed to him that day I thought that was a pretty mature call from him to make that call and not push himself,” Fent said.

Ramsden, who this season has a 14-4 record at 145 pounds, is finally able to compete after more than a year away from sports due to a severe knee injury, and knows the value of taking care of his body even while competing for the highest place he can in the sport this season.

“If it would have been district or state, I would have gutted it out,” he said.

The move is one that will help ensure his chances of competing at those bigger tournaments later in the year, and the fact that he’s in position to have a strong senior season is one he relishes after missing the last year.

“(Former Wallowa football coach) Matt Brockamp always told us you never know when it’s going to be your last down. I took that to heart, especially after I got hurt,” Ramsden said.

That last down on the football field was more than a year ago, late in the fourth quarter of an Oct. 1, 2021, game between Wallowa and Cove in Cove.

The Cougars had a small lead late in the fourth quarter, and were striving to keep the Leopards out of the end zone.

Ramsden remembers the play that sent him to the sidelines for the rest of the year.

“I made a tackle on the quarterback. I tackled him low, and I think we went kneecap to kneecap or my kneecap to his shin,” he said. “I remember getting up, hobbling over to the sideline. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to play anymore.

“I remember looking down to make sure there was no bone sticking out.”

Cove later in the quarter scored the winning touchdown for a 34-28 victory, but Wallowa lost more than the game. Ramsden was out with a right patella that, he said, was broken in three different places.

While he said it was better than the alternative of a ligament injury, he said his ligaments were impacted. With his leg immobilized to allow the kneecap to heal, he lost strength in those ligaments and in his leg muscles. Even a year later, there is still some strength lacking on the right side.

“The bone was doing pretty good after six weeks, (but) all my ligaments took so much longer to get back to using, and my muscle is still not even adequate,” he said.

Interestingly, if he does tweak his knee now, it’s in fact the ligaments that cause him grief.

“I know that whenever I do tweak it, it’s not the kneecap that is hurting.”

Difficult decisionThe injury kept him out of wrestling and track for his junior year, but he was cleared to play football this past fall, which would have been his final year in his favorite sport.

Ramsden was left with a difficult decision, and elected to sit out his final season of football. He said he is a player who goes all out when he steps into a sport, and didn’t feel he would be able to do so on the football field with the movements the former quarterback was used to making.

“I go 100%, and if your body can’t withstand that there are going to be more problems,” he said. … “It definitely wasn’t good enough to do all that jumping and cutting, so I opted out.”

He said he was supported in the decision by his family, and though he had teammates who hoped he would come out and encouraged him to do so, he said the decision wasn’t met negatively.

“You hear from your teammates how bad we want you out there, but I never heard pressure,” he said. “I definitely got support from every aspect.”

The decision allowed more time for him to heal, to strengthen his knee and to be wrestling — a sport that, while physically demanding, wouldn’t pose some of the challenges of football.

“Wrestling being low-impact but intense, I felt a little more comfortable wrestling than having to run on those ligaments,” he said.

The decision appears to be paying off, and Fent said the senior is proving to be a good addition to the team.

“His mental capacity, his IQ for athletics, is pretty remarkable,” Fent said. “He really hasn’t missed much as far as the last couple years of wrestling. He’s very engaged, he’s got a positive attitude — he hasn’t really missed a beat at all.”

Fent said the senior also adds an element of leadership, which also has not lacked even with the time away, or given the fact that the last time he wrestled, it was as part of a cooperative with Joseph.

“He stepped right into our program, (has) such a good attitude, (has) got a good rapport with the other boys,” Fent said. “He’s a very quiet leader, willing to try whatever.”

Fent noted that when Ramsden wrestles, there is no sign that he’s being impeded at all by the knee, or that it’s causing any hesitancy for him when on the mat.

Ramsden made a similar note.

“It’s been really good. It’s obviously sore occasionally,” he said. “It hasn’t held me back from going 100%.”

He’s able this winter to compete without regrets, including over the decision to sit out football, in hopes that he can make a deep run at the district or state tournament.

“Every match I go in thinking, ‘No regrets. Leave it all out there. Whatever happens, happens,’” Ramsden said. “I’m going to do everything in my power to win this match.”